The Unbound

“And you threw me into the void,” he says matter-of-factly. “The way I see it, we both did what we had to do. I didn’t enjoy deceiving you, and I didn’t want to kill you—I told you that then—but you were in my way. I’m here to find out if you still are.”

“I will always be in your way, Owen.”

A pale brow arches. “If only your thoughts were as sure as your words, Miss Bishop. But they don’t lie as easily. Do you know what’s written all over your mind? Doubt. You used to be so certain about your ideals—the Archive is law, is good, is god, trust in them, trust in Da—but your ideals are crumbling. The Archive is broken. Da knew—he had to know—and he still let them have you. Your head is full of questions, full of fears, and they are so loud I can barely hear the rest of you. And when Agatha hears them, she’s going to treat you like rot in her precious Archive. She’ll see you as something to be cut out before it spreads. And not even your beloved Roland will be able to stop her.” He brings his hands up to the wall on either side of me, caging me in. “You want to know why I’m here? Why I haven’t just slit your throat? Because unlike the Archive, I believe in salvaging what can be saved. And you, Mackenzie… Well, it would be a crime to let you go to waste. I want you to help me.”

“Help you do what?”

The ghost of a smile touches his lips. “Finish what I started.”

TWENTY-FIVE

I ALMOST LAUGH. And then I realize that Owen is serious.

“Why would I ever help you?”

“Other than self-preservation?” says Owen, pushing off the wall. “I can give you what you want.” He wanders around the bed to the bedside table. “I can give you back your grandfather.” His fingers trail along the edge of a photo before reaching for the blue bear beside the lamp. “And your brother, Ben.”

Owen’s fingers close around the bear just before I slam him back against the wall. Ben’s stuffed animal tumbles from his grasp.

“How dare you?” I hiss, pi

Owen doesn’t fight back. Instead he levels his infuriatingly calm gaze on me. “That won’t solve your problems. Not anymore.”

“It’s a start.”

Owen’s hand flies up and wraps around my bad wrist. “So much misdirected anger,” he says, tightening his grip. I gasp at the pain, but the room holds steady around me as I pull back—and to my surprise, he lets go. I cradle my wrist, and Owen crosses his arms.

“Fine,” he says. “Let your dead rest. I can give you something else.”

“What’s that?” I snap. “Freedom? Purpose?”

Owen’s blue eyes narrow. “A life.”

I frown. “What?”

“A life, Mackenzie. One where you don’t have to hide what you are or what you do. No more secrets you don’t want to keep. No more lies you don’t want to tell. One life.”

“You can’t give me that.”

“You’re right. I can’t give it to you. But I can help you take it.”

One life? Does he mean a chance to walk away? To be normal? No more lying to my family, no more holding back from Wes? But there wouldn’t be a Wes, because Wes belongs to the Archive, Wes believes in the Archive. Even if I could walk away, he wouldn’t. I would never ask him to, and it doesn’t matter because it’s not possible. The Archive never lets you go. Not intact, anyway.

“What you’re promising doesn’t exist.”

“Not yet,” says Owen. “But by the time I’m done it will.”

“You mean once you’ve torn the Archive down—how did you put it, Owen? Branch by branch and shelf by shelf? You know I won’t let you.”

“What if I told you I didn’t have to? That the Archive would stay, and you would stay with it if you wanted to? Only no more secrets. Would that be worth fighting for?”

“You’re lying,” I whisper. “You’re just telling me what I want to hear.”

Owen sighs. “I’m telling you the truth. The fact that you want to hear it means you should listen.”

But how can I listen? What he’s saying is madness. A dream, and a poisonous one at that. I watch as Owen crosses to the radio and switches it off.

“It’s late,” he says. “Think about what I’ve said. Sleep on it. If you’re still determined to fight me, you can do so in the morning. And if at that point I’m feeling merciful, I’ll kill you whole before the Archive can destroy you bit by bit.”

The Owen in my nightmares does not walk away, but this one does. He gets halfway to the bedroom door, then pauses and turns back, tugging Da’s key back out from under his collar. He offers it to me, and it hangs between us like a promise. Or a trap.

“As proof,” he says, “that I’m real.”

Everything in me tenses when the metal hits my palm. The cool weight of Da’s key—my key—sends a shiver through me. I loop it over my head, the weight settling against my chest. It feels like a small piece of the world has been made right. Then Owen turns, opens the door, and strides silently away.

I follow, watching light spill into the dim living room as he slips out of the apartment and into the yellow hall. Something thuds behind me, and I spin to find Dad asleep in a corner chair, a book now on the floor beside him. Even in sleep, his face is creased with worry; as I kneel to retrieve the book, I wonder what it would be like to tell my parents why I have nightmares. Why I have scars. Where I vanish to. Why I cringe from their touch.

I hate Owen all the more for planting the thought in my head, because it’s not possible. A world without these secrets and lies could never exist.

But as I set Dad’s book on the table and tug a blanket up over his shoulders, a question whispers in my head.

What if?

I don’t remember drifting off, but one minute I’m staring at the door and the next my alarm is sounding. I should be relieved that I didn’t dream, and there is a small, rebellious flicker of happiness in my chest, but it dies as soon as I remember Owen: my own living nightmare. Except I’m begi

Da’s key is still pressed against my skin, and I force myself to take it off and bury it in the top drawer of my bedside table. My ring is still sitting on the windowsill, but I don’t dare put it on if it’ll blind me to Owen’s presence. Instead I find a necklace chain and loop the band through it, sliding the silver piece over my head and tucking it beneath the collar of my uniform shirt.

It’s going to be a long day without a buffer.

My list is holding steady at three names, but I can’t push my luck, especially now that I know Agatha’s search for Crew will come up empty. Mom’s in the kitchen swearing about how she can’t find her keys while the news plays out on the TV. I watch, expecting the crime scene at Hyde to be the top story, but it’s never mentioned, and all I can think is that the storage room hasn’t been discovered yet.

Mom, meanwhile, is still searching under papers, through her purse, in the drawers for her keys. She won’t find them because they’re stashed in the freezer under a bag of peas.

“I don’t need you to drive me,” I say. “Really. Just let me go myself.”

“This isn’t up for negotiation,” she says, nearly upsetting a cup of coffee as she scours the mess on the kitchen table.

“I know you don’t trust me—”

“It’s not that,” she says. “I just don’t want you riding your bike until your arm’s healed.”

And just like that, I’ve got her. Hook. Line. Sinker. “You’re right. I’ll take the bus.”

Mom stops searching and straightens. “You hate the bus,” she says. “You called it a tiny box filled with germs and dirt.”

“Well,” I say, shouldering my bag, “life is messy. And there’s a stop a block from school.” I don’t actually know if this is true. Luckily, neither does Mom.